Final Farewell
by Goddess of Unfinished Projects
Summary: He would never heal from this, he knew. It was a wound few healed from. To lose someone so close to you was akin to losing one’s heart. You were never the same afterwards, only a shell . . . One Shot, angsty but I rather like it!


**Author's Note: Not my usual fare but I got inspired by the song "Rain" by Breaking Benjamin and couldn't help myself.**

**Final Farewell**

Twilight was deepening as the rain lashed the cemetery. Soaked, sodden, and dripping, the trees spaced around the graves hung their branches low, as thought they too were in mourning. The world shimmered in shades of silver and gray, a tribute to loss and love. Monuments to those of the bygone days stood in somber silence, observing the one living member in their midst, an outcast among them and his own kind.

One hand rested on the tombstone, the granite slick and cold beneath his fingers. The name stood carved in eloquent swirls and curves, she would have hated that. A ghost of a smile flitted across his face at the thought of her reaction to it. Rolling the item he held for her in his hands, he sighed, she would speak no more to him . . .

He would never heal from this, he knew. It was a wound few healed from. To lose someone so close to you was akin to losing one's heart. You were never the same afterwards, only a shell . . .

Flowers covered the muddy gash in the ground that had so recently been filled, like some obscenely bright bandage on a fatal wound. He knelt beside them and ran his fingers over the soft damp petals of a rose. _"Her namesake"_, he thought, picking it up. The wilting white flower was heavy in his hand, soaked to the core with rain. He placed a gentle kiss upon the flower and laid it across the wide base of her monument, such a cold place to leave her. She deserved somewhere warm and comforting for all the comfort she had provided in life.

With a heartfelt sigh, he looked down at the object he held. His last gift to her.

Gently, he settled it into a place of honor beside the rose, being sure not to damage it.

He had invested in the case himself, something that could withstand the years. The item it housed was so simple that many would question its relevance in a cemetery but . . . It had been vastly important to them. Inside the case was a framed picture, not a photograph but a child's drawing done in a rage during her father's absence. It depicted a rabbit wearing gentleman's clothing with a stern look upon his face. He smiled fondly, if her father had only known what leaving his little Rose did . . .

With each absence, she had grown wilder, more uncontrollable. Her mother was often absent as well, leaving her in the care of her nursemaids who rarely understood or cared for her. However, her parents were, like many parents of the elite, distanced from their daughter by the rolls they played in life. A prominent stockbroker has no time to read Charlotte's Web with his daughter. A country club wife has no time to teach her daughter to braid her dolls' hair. Rose had long tried to combat their silence with chatter but eventually it had given way to shouting and cries for attention. They didn't know how much she needed them.

How much she'd needed him . . . He smiled at the drawing. A child's cry for help . . . Answered.

He closed his eyes, remembering how it had been.

"_Stupid father with his stupid partners and the stupid firm!" her sigh evolved into a sob, "And his stupid watch. He never has time. Ever . . ."_

_He'd just come into being, watching her scribble frantically on the page. He had no body yet, nor personality. He was being drawn into the world, quite literally. Eyes, newly sketched, formed, followed by his body, a whispy child's figment at first. He held no substance yet for she hadn't recognized him. She continued to draw furiously, making the image of her father in the most comical form her six-year-old mind could picture, a rabbit. Finished, she threw the crayon across the room where it cracked against the wall. Tears slid down her cheeks as she turned to fling herself on the bed. Those emerald eyes looked up into his own and he settled into reality, grounded by becoming flesh and blood at last._

"_I'm afraid; miss, that I shall have to insist you pick that up. You're making quite the display." he'd remarked, a feeling of sense and polite mannerisms clicking into place._

_There'd been a moments pause before she'd flung herself into his arms, bawling._

_He hadn't been frightened or upset in the least, simply holding her until she was calmed again. This, he understood, was what he was here for. If she couldn't have a father she at least deserved a friend._

The tears spilled freely down his cheeks at the memory, mingling with the rain. He rose, unsteadily, to his feet. He'd found himself unsteady more often in her absence and he believed it to be the absence of his balance. Her.

Another figure came up beside him, carefully placing a hand on his arm. The child of his Rose's daughter. Francis looked over at him from beneath her umbrella, her face a picture of concern and misery.

"I'm sorry . . ." she whispered, "I can't be her."

He nodded solemnly, "No one could."

"You can stay at the house . . . I'll keep you on as manager." she replied, "You won't need to be adopted."

With a sigh, he shook his head, "Miss Francis, adoption is our business. I cannot rightly take my place as manager unless I have been adopted. It would not set a proper example for the rest of the house."

She returned his sigh, as though she knew this would happen, "Mister Herriman-"

"I will take up my place as a resident until such time." he stated firmly, "Madame Foster would have wished it."

"No. She wouldn't have and you know it." Francis replied, a touch of anger in her voice, "She would have wanted you to keep the dream alive! You're the only one who can do this? Don't you understand? I can't run the house by myself! I'm just the cleaning crew! I don't know anything about adoption papers and reference sheets and permits and legalities! I need you, Mister H."

He observed her frustration with interest, "Do you, Miss Francis?"

She paused, caught in a slip of the tongue, "I mean . . . we need you. The house needs you."

Silence reigned as he contemplated what she had said. Then he felt a hand grasp his own. Turning to her, he saw the pain on her face, "I can't do this alone Mister Herriman . . . Please. You're all the family I have left . . ."

She had Rose's eyes, deep and pleading, filled with a need for family. He'd been a father to one Foster already, and a grandfather to a second . . . What role would be play in this one's life?

"I'll adopt you . . . just . . . Stay. Please?" Francis whispered, lowering her eyes.

The offer stole his breath. Adopt him? He always envisioned that if she made a choice it would be Master Wilt or perhaps Master Eduardo that she would adopt, certainly not himself. With one gloved hand, he raised her face, "Are you certain, Miss Francis, that you do not offer adoption as a way of shirking your duties to the house as it's mistress?"

Francis nodded stubbornly, "I need you financially, yeah, but . . . I also need you personally. I can't leave you to the whims of some strangers. You were my grandmother's imaginary friend. She kept beyond the point of giving you up. You're not some stray. You are family. And I won't abandon you."

Removed his hand from her cheek, he wiped at his own eyes to clear them of both rain and tears. To be taken in. To be accepted. To be loved again. He understood more deeply than he believed possible, what Madame Foster saw in the adopters when arrived at the house. Angels . . . Every last one.

With a sweep of his hand, he removed his hat and bowed to her soberly, "Then I am yours, Frankie."

Francis smiled sadly and hugged him tightly, "I wish it didn't have to be this way" she said, casting a look in the direction of her grandmother's stone, "but . . . I'm glad."

As they turned to go, arm in arm, he sent one final farewell to his beloved creator, recalling the epitaph that graced her tombstone:

Rose Marie Foster

June 6th, 1938 - November 21st, 2005

Beloved wife, mother, grandmother, creator, and matron

Who dared to dream beyond her wildest dreams.

May your dreams live on forever.


End file.
